October 5
At this point HOUSING is the great need. The county parks are refusing to take in fire victims in so many places where they have hookups. Families are adapting, willing to live in RV’s (when they can obtain one) for now, but there is little space for them. The few places renting space offer no discount and charge double an average mobile trailer rent. How is it that those who have spent their life tending the land, cannot find a place to rest on her?
And worse, why are my people having to defend their existence here? I have been on the other end of too many good people who ask, “Do you think they’ll return home?”
Whaaat?
This IS their home. They have raised their children here. This is the only home their children have ever known because their parents were here serving America. They belong here.
My people are having to defend themselves, explain, “Maybe I could move with family over there (some other state), but I’ve lived here 20 years and it’s our home. My children were planning to go to college here. I want them to have a better life” We are so used to hearing this narrative of struggle that we and they accept it. Rather than ask, why are the white working and middle class fire survivors not having to justify their existence here? They may have moved here a short while ago, simply because they like the PNW and may not have contributed at all to the land. No one is asking me whether they will be going home. Because I’m light skinned they probably wouldn’t ask me, even though I’ve only lived here a year. I’m heartbroken that on top of all the devastation and loss, my people have to navigate this unconscious othering.
Our ancestors did not have borders. Our ancestors traveled the land. Many came from this northern land to southern land.
My family and I were once so fortunate to be part of a land reclamation ceremony in Santa Ana, California. The ceremonial Aztec danzante leader honored the six directions and faced the circle of people from the neighborhood who had lived for years feeling like “immigrants,” less than, not belonging. He told us/them that the blood and the seeds of our ancestors are in this earth. They are not foreigners. They belong and deserve to live with dignity, with our hands in the earth and our children playing and growing connected to mama Tierra. Tears of recognition and remembering flowed.
People don’t realize not long ago most of California was Mexico. And before the conquests and oppressive colonialism it simply belonged to the people. For thousands of years our ancestors thrived in interdependence with this land. We did not cross the border, the border crossed us. We are living a short experiment of conquest and separation, settlement and borders in the long span of history. Please do not accept this current version of the PNW as reality. Now is a time to reach much farther back toward our mutual humanity.
To survive climate change, collectively, we need to see and move past the false limitations of capitalism, colonialism/government controlled land, individual land ownership. We must RECLAIM humanity, love, connection and co-creation with mama Tierra for all.
My native brothers and sisters have been saying this for a long time.
In the wake of destruction, we all have the opportunity to create a more balanced, interdependent and nourishing future for our children. We are better and bigger than all the limitations of colonialism that hurt everyone. We have the opportunity to HEAL this painful history with every step we take right now….
Yesterday, my family and I participated in the creation of an earth altar on the scorched land. We came together to bless and adorn MamaTierra, to recall her regenerative powers within and around us. This practice lies deep in all of our histories. Our ancestors from all our lands of origin, were deeply intertwined with her rhythms.
My youngest insisted we decorate the P for the Phoenix who will rise from the ashes. He walked through the trees with knowing, relishing the love, prayers and healing held in the flowers, fruit, leaves, seeds. Renewal. Trust. Rooted wisdom in his bones, reconciliation of colonizer and colonized in his/our blood. He lives and he knows.
We are home. We are ALL home wherever our feet touch the earth in humility and reverence.
Let’s step into this new beginning led by the wisdom of the children and our ancestors.
I continue to seek donations to help the Latinx community to find a semblance of home, in a way that supports dignity, autonomy and mutual humanity.
To Donate:
Go Fund Me: www.gofundme.com/f/almedafireslatinxrelief
Venmo: @sylvia-Poareo
Note:
I’ve been sharing my experience of the Almeda Fire in southern Oregon on my Facebook page, but I want to share it here so you can all walk with me on this journey. Click the “Almeda Fire” tag at the bottom of this post to read the entire series.